The Cloverfield Monster Revealed!*

* Maaaybe
And shockingly it's not that super skeezy guy that hangs around near the Ralph's on Cloverfield Blvd who's probably a pedophile (person may not actually exist) and it's not Clay Aiken in Spamalot either, though that is a terrfiying sight (like a parody of a dressed up Irishman.)


So Cloverfield is finally coming out this Friday and though I wasn't too excited about it before I am now, now that I know the girl who played Sue from "life as we know it" Jessica Lucas is in it. But even though I'm late to the excitement party the internets have been all a twitter with speculation over the nature of the beast. As such everyone wants to know what exactly it looks like, because being surprised is soo 20th century and with that in mind here are a few examples of what may be the Cloverfield Monster.
Apparently it's not this thing

which is good because it looks too...like a snail minus its shell but with legs. And like it would be oozey
(I think this may be the same thing but in an alternate view-not sure)

It might be this 6 legged creature (though 2 arms are very T-Rex functional) with cheeks that look like baboon bottoms

Or perhaps it is this bipedal very dinosaur looking thing with a unicorn horn

(I actually hope not- that looks too Sci-Fi network)
Of course those aren't the only ideas and interpreations.
This guy made a video to advance his claim that the monster is actually Godzilla, but minus the "God" part in order to fulfill JJ Abram's dream of reinterpreting the character but in a way that doesn't breach contract or copyright

though I am a little dubious not only because of the fact one tends to lose a little authority upon the misspelling of "George." But if it were actually Godzilla I'd actually be happy; you can do a lot with that icon if you do it well.
Anyway this intrepid sleuth put together, slowed down and did something or the other of the few seconds of the actual monster from the actual trailer

which proves....it's green,probably bipedal and big. Mind=blown.

But my absolute favorite theory is this guy's based upon a script for an opera he'd been writing:

The monster in "Cloverfield" is Manhattan. The sea beast is the island itself. Why do I think this?
Depossession is my rock opera about the building of the Brooklyn Bridge. In it, the bridge's real purpose is to strap the leviathan that is Manhattan in place. Depossession is about the bridge's builders, the Roebling family, and the strange illness that affects the foundation diggers (In reality, this disease is the bends, but in my opera it's caused by proximity to the monster.)

While the opera us still in development and probably won't be in production until 2008, I've performed songs from it since 2002 and have told stories from it daily as a tour guide atop the Grayline double-decker buses. The music you're hearing in this video comes from two of the opera's instrumentals.

Ok, so back to Cloverfield - why am I so sure that the monster in Cloverfield is the island itself?

Here are Six reasons:

Reason One: Check out the movie poster. Note how the wake in the water is even from the Statue of Libery to Battery Park. Now either that is a super fast kind on monster or it means that whatever rose in the water sank back uniformly, as if you pulled your arm down all at once in a swimming pool.

Reason Two: Check out this little snippet of a clip. Look closely. Now let's slow that down and stop. Looks like a giant tentacle, right?. That, I believe, is the same tentacle that reached out to grab the head off the Statue of Libery, flinging it into the city, crushing buildings along the way. Kind of like thisÉ

Reason Three: That would also explain the fireworks we see in the trailer. All these explosions are thrusting up from the ground. The explosions are coming up because the land itself is rising up.

Reason Four: Note that the news coverage after the first rumbling in the city speculates that there might have been an earthquake. I suppose a real big monster might cause that kind of seismic activity - but an earthquake is more likely still if the island itself is the monster.

Reason Five: A lot of speculation has circulated around one of the lines from the movie: "It's Alive." Why would that be such a significant line? Because of the novelty of the island itself being alive.

Reason Six: Note than in the beginning of the teaser or the trailer, I'm not sure where it is, there's a piece of text on the screen, it says: "Multiple sighting of case designate 'Cloverfield' camera retrieved at incident site U.S. 447 area formerly known as Central Park". Now, I'll bet you anything that they picked up that video in the water. Because the island itself is gone, and the area indicated by the number 447 is where the island used to be.

That would actually be trippy and a little more terrifying in that if the bridges were down that you couldn't just hide from the monster stomping through the city because the terror would be under your feet...though that's extremely far fetched. Either way I like his creativity and thinking outside the sphere; it's fun, and a lot more in the spirit than Gregg Easterbrook's back to reality trip in TMQ

Internet chatter says the monster in Cloverfield is caused when a sinister corporation discovers a growth substance that gets out of control; either an undersea creature or a person (Web reports differ) grows to the size of a skyscraper. If this is the story line, critics may somberly contend the movie reflects social fears of steroids, HGH and genetic engineering. Or maybe they'll somberly call the flick a 9/11 parable. My guess is the movie will represent a searing social commentary on derivative plot elements, product placement and viral marketing.
...if the plot rumor about Cloverfield is correct, TMQ notes in advance: No matter what strange substance you swallowed or what radiation you were exposed to, you could not grow to the size of a skyscraper unless you consumed fantastic amounts of food. Mass doesn't materialize out of the air. The Empire State Building weighs 365,000 tons. Let's assume a biological monster of that building's magnitude, with some sort of bone structure rather than steel, could weigh less. A skyscraper-height monster would need to weigh say 100,000 tons, meaning the Cloverfield creature would need to consume at least 100,000 tons of nutrients to reach its size, then more for energy. That's a lot of Whoppers or plankton or whatever. Objects cannot spontaneously gain mass; material is required

.
Boo- such a spoilsport. Whatevs, I still think I'll enjoy it a lot as I watch it Saturday night, really drunk and tired after the caucus OR I'll probably just end up seeing 27 Dresses
{UPDATE: I forgot another one of my favorite theories that the whole movie has something to do with Wolfmother and that the monster may have been inspired by their album cover

Sphere: Related Content

The Life as We Know It Files

(here I'll try to occasionally write about things that were brilliant and taken from us too soon, just like the perfection that was Life as We Know It)

I can never and will never forgive The O.C. I hated that show from the beginning because of its overvapidness, the fact that being from So. Cal their version of Orange County was foreign and ludicrous but just as importantly because the other girls, especially Freshmen year, were absolutely in love with it. All of these faults I could forgive; it was quite easy to think of that show as merely harmless and to not include it in my daily thoughts. But that was before I discovered Life as We Know It.

Sophomore year I was hanging out in Jay's room when we were watching television, or more specifically flipping through channels before Thursday night debauchery began. I don't remember what made me tell Jay to turn back to abc, if I had heard about the show somewhere, but I like to remember it as in the few seconds it was on as we were channel surfing that I recognized some sort of spark of genius. Most likely someone hot was on screen and there was some sort of flirtation. Anyway we watched that first episode and realized the show was all about these teenage boys trying to get laid, along with the Zack Morris type "time out." All the characters were so cheesy and akward and real, as looking back at teenagers from a few years on all seem to be not to mention attractive. And then there was Kelly Osbourne, trying to fake an American accent, and not quite succeeding and of course being a little "plumper" and goth then everyone else. But it didn't matter, we were hooked and begin to tell all of our friends about it.

Pretty soon we were organizing viewing parties where talking (or more accurately, discussing the finer points of the show) were limited to commercial breaks. Moms were sleeping with hockey coaches (which of course the son sees!), kids were sleeping with their young teachers (in janitor's closets and the like), Dino couldn't get it up, parents sleeping with parents someone really liking Kelly Osbourne, and it had a midget as a guidance counselor, I mean the show was fantastic! And the drama was so teenagey and overblown, but the drama in our own lives at that point mirrored it. In real life two of our super close friends, who of course were members of our lawki parties, had broken up, which Jay and I had to deal with outside at like 2:30 in the morning-though we were able to finagle a Rick's trip out of it.) Anyway, at around the same time on the show Dino had broken up with his girlfriend, and their interactions were full of longing and akwardness and friends feeling they need to choose sides and all the inevitabliness of recent break ups. As we watched, our friends drama was played out on the screen just as it was played out in real life. Looking back it was awesome and perfect, though at the time, of course, it sucked.

We watched the show religiously but then for some reason abc decided to move it to the time slot opposite The O.C. Why they would do such a thing I will never understand. I mean this was, back in 2004, when The O.C. was a juggernaut in our age group, the same age group, of course that Life as We Know It was targeted . LAWKI was such a better, less soap opera, incredibly realistically written show, I mean we had grown to love even Kelly Osbourne. And then suddenly it was gone one Thursday. We checked online but it had been removed from the schedule. it was a horrible horrible day.

Eventually Jay bought the dvd and we watched it on rare occassions, but it was never the same. Our days of innocence were over. But now whenever I see any of the actors playing any other role, I immediately think off them on Life As We Know It, whether the Mom is in an aspirin commercial or playing Ellen's first girlfriend, whether Jackie, Dino's girlfriend is on Heroes or that gymnastics movie I never saw, or watching Ben play a statutory rapist on SVU, I can only think of them as they were, back when I knew what Life was. (sigh, ::tear::)

oh an by the time you'll read this it will be past 11 a.m pacific time and thus officially summer. Happy Summer Solstice!!!

Sphere: Related Content